The Rev’d Quintin Morrow
Saint Andrew’s Episcopal Church
Fort Worth, Texas
www.st-andrew.com
“The Song That Satisfies the Soul”
August 11, 2002
The Text: Psalm 63
The Text Summary:
In the midst of great trouble the Psalmist remembers God’s consistent protection in the past, praises Him for His anticipated provision now, and renews his own trust in His loving providence for the future.
The Text Outline: (The Coverdale Psalter)
I. The believer finds his help and satisfaction in God (vv.1-2).
a. The believer seeks God earnestly.
b. The believer seeks God entirely.
II. The believer praises the provision, protection, power, and providence of God (vv.3-8).
a. This praise involves remembering and retelling God’s mighty acts of redemption in the past (“Because thou hast been my helper; therefore under the shadow of thy wings will I rejoice” v.8).
b. This praise involves realizing God’s mighty acts of redemption now (“As long as I live I will magnify thee…and lift up my hands in thy name” v.5).
c. This praise anticipates God’s mighty acts of redemption for the future (“My soul shall be satisfied…when my mouth praiseth thee with joyful lips” v. 6).
III. The believer exercises trust in the future faithfulness of the Lord (vv. 9-12).
a. The believer relies upon God (“My soul hangeth upon thee” v. 9).
b. The believer receives rescue from God (“These also that seek the hurt of my soul, they shall go under the earth” v. 10).
O God, thou art my God; early will I seek thee.
My soul thirsteth for thee, my flesh longeth after thee,
in a barren and dry land where no water is
(Ps. 63:1-2, Coverdale Psalter).
It seems there was a certain man stranded and lost in the desert of Death Valley. He was crawling across the burning sand, dying of thirst, when he happened upon a necktie salesman. “Can I interest you, sir, in a nice, new, hand-dyed silk necktie?” the salesman queried. “Have you lost your mind?” the man gasped. “I am dying of thirst and you want to sell me a necktie?!” The salesman shrugged his shoulders and went on his way, while thirsty man resumed his crawling. Finally, after hours of crawling in the desert sand the man came upon an unbelievable sight. There, in the middle of the desert, was a huge restaurant with flashing neon lights and a parking lot filled with cars. The desperate man mustered the energy and crawled to the restaurant’s front door. He whispered to the restaurant’s doorman, “Please, help me in. I am dying of thirst and must have something to drink.” The doorman replied with a disapproving frown, “I am sorry, sir, gentlemen are not admitted to this restaurant without a necktie.”
Thirsting and longing for God. How many of us here this morning could admit honestly to a thirst and a longing for God? Not many of us, probably. That isn’t to say that we don’t long for something; we do. It is rather to only admit that for most of us the object of our longing isn’t God.
In his helpful commentary on the psalms, the late James Montgomery Boice says that in every Christian worship service there are present three types of people. The first are those who are Christian in name only. Like the curious who followed Jesus everywhere during His earthly ministry, these folks appear to be disciples of the Lord but only hang around as long as the signs and wonders and free food hold out. The second types of people present, according to Boice, are those who follow the Lord Jesus, but follow at a distance. Like St. Peter at Jesus’ arrest in the garden, they are followers, but they don’t want to risk anything or be discovered by others to be followers. And the third types of people present in Christian worship are those who come wanting God. These be they who follow Christ—not for the sake of the benefits, nor fearful of the cost, but simply because they know that only God can satisfy the deepest yearnings of the human soul.
David, Israel’s shepherd-king, was one of these. He is the author of the beautiful and stirring psalm appointed for this morning: Psalm 63. According the psalm’s superscription, or rubric beneath the psalm’s numeric designation found in our Bibles but not the Prayer Book Psalter, Psalm 63 is a psalm of David when he was in the wilderness of Judah. We only know of two times that David was in the desert of Judah: the first was when he was on the run from Saul, and second was when he was on the run from son, Absalom. Psalm 63 clearly describes the latter exile.
The historical background for the appeals made in Psalm 63 is recorded for us vividly in II Samuel chapters 15-19. David’s son, Absalom, spent four years winning the hearts and loyalty of the people of Israel from his father. When he felt politically strong enough, Absalom instigated a rebellion against David and set up a rival kingship in Hebron. Unprepared, David had to flee Jerusalem for the desert of Judah with those few who remained loyal to him. You will notice verse 10 of Psalm 63 speaks of those “that seek the hurt of my soul”—literally the destruction of David’s life—and at the head of that pack was his son. Can you imagine the pain and anguish David must have felt knowing the son of his own body was out to cut his throat. You see, not only was David on the run and physically present in the desert of Judah, but he was in an emotional and spiritual desert as well. And it was there, in that lonely, arid, dangerous land, the king called out to God—the only one he knew that could save him and satisfy the deepest longings of his soul.
Psalm 63 could be summarized adequately this way:
In the midst of trouble the Psalmist remembers God’s consistent protection in the past, praises Him for His anticipated provision now, and renews his own trust in God’s loving providence for the future.
Have you ever stopped to ponder the irony of those who seemed drawn and those who seemed offended and repelled by Jesus in the Gospels? It was the drunks, the prostitutes, and the tax collectors who were drawn to Him; and it was the seemingly righteous, and religious, and people of means and reputation that were offended by Him. C.S. Lewis correctly explains that phenomenon when he wrote, “Prostitutes are in no danger of finding their present life so satisfactory that they cannot turn to God: the proud, the avaricious, the self-righteous, are in that danger.”
In many ways our prosperity works against us. Firstly, it provides a kind of spiritual buffer between us and want so that we don’t have to depend on God for our needs but rather can trust the Stock Market instead. Secondly, our prosperity creates a mask of care-free happiness that can conceal deep and abiding pain and emptiness. Travail seems to be the great leveler in this life. Rich or poor, sinner or saint, we are none of us immune from the hurt of a divorce, the pain of a wayward child, or emptiness of death.
Many of us spend our lives chasing the wind. We think that longing for significance—really that hunger to know God and to be known by God everlastingly—is only a desire for food, fame, fortune, fun or sex. Consequently, we chase trinkets. The truth is that God and only God can provide for you, protect you, save you, and fill the vacuum in your lives. St. Augustine knew it. He said that our souls are restless till they find their rest in God. The psalmist knew it. He declares in Psalm 63 that he seeks for God, he thirsts for God, he longs for God, because His loving-kindness is better than life itself.
Psalm 63 is a song about what satisfies the soul. Here is what it teaches us about true joy, about the impeccable character of God, and our confidence in Him, and how faith grows.
Firstly, notice that believers find their help and satisfaction in God, and in God alone (vv.1-2).
“O God, thou art my God; early will I seek thee. My soul thirsteth for thee, my flesh longeth after thee, in a barren and dry land where no water is.”
Notice that you and I, as regenerate, blood-bought believers, are to seek God earnestly and entirely. In other words, knowing Him and pleasing Him should be our consuming passion.
What we are normally satisfied with doing is simply adopting some of the minor external requirements of the Christian religion to our already busy lives, and merely adding God to the many other loves, desires and passions that drive us. Lesslie Newbigin relays how he arrived in India as a Christian missionary, only to hear from his predecessor that his region of India had already been successfully evangelized for the Gospel. What Newbigin discovered, however, was that the locals had simply added Christ to the pantheon of other Hindu gods and goddesses they had worshipped for centuries. But God will be lord of all or Lord not at all. Given who God is, and what He has done for us, and will yet do for us, our only response is to make knowing God, pleasing God, and finding our satisfaction in God the consuming preoccupation of our life. We tend to seek to God and find satisfaction in God, plus position, possessions, power, pleasure, or you can fill in the blank. What part of Jesus’ “Love God with all that you are and all that you have” do we misunderstand? The question for us this morning is whether we are like the Disciples who left their nets, their fields, and their counting houses to follow Christ when beckoned to do so, or whether we are like the rich young ruler who walked away sad at the Lord’s invitation to follow Him because it would’ve cost too much.
How do we come to possess such a passion for God? It is simpler than you think. It begins with knowing who we really are and what we’ve done, and knowing who God really is and what He’s done. We are miserable offenders apart from grace with no spiritual health in us. God is holy, just and loving, and He sent His Son Jesus Christ to die as our sin-debt that we might be acquitted and have everlasting life. We did all the sinning. He did all the saving. That’s why in The Parable of Pharisee and the Publican in Luke chapter 18 the self-righteous Pharisee can only congratulate himself in prayer and the tax collector can only humbly appeal for mercy. Paul Thigpen said it like this: “The secret of a passion for God: The greater the debt, the greater the devotion” (Discipleship Journal, Issue 66). Jesus said it like this about the sinful woman who came and washed His feet with her tears and dried them with her hair : “Wherefore I say unto thee, Her sins, which are many, are forgiven; for she loved much: but to whom little is forgiven, the same loveth little” (Lk. 7:47).
Secondly, notice from Psalm 63 that believers make it a habit to praise the provision, protection, power, and providence of God (vv. 3-8). This praise involves recalling and retelling God’s mighty acts of redemption in the past: (verse 8)“Because thou hast been my helper; therefore under the shadow of thy wings will I rejoice.” This praise involves realizing God’s mighty acts of redemption, provision, protection now: (verse 5) “As long as I live I will magnify thee…and lift up my hands in thy name.” And this habit of praise anticipates God’s mighty acts of rescue for the future: (verse 6) “My soul shall be satisfied…when my mouth praiseth thee with joyful lips.”
Our trouble is that we have forgotten what we were created and redeemed for. We think we’re here for us, and we aren’t. We are here for Him. St. Paul reminds us II Cor. 5:15 that Christ died to save us so that we would live no longer for ourselves, but for Him who died for us and rose again. The first question and answer of the Westminster Catechism is this: “What is the chief end of man?” That is, what are we here for? What were we created to do? What is our purpose for being? The answer: “To glorify God and to enjoy Him forever.”
We’ve forgotten about the primacy of praise. We think wrong-headedly that worship for the Christian is optional. But it isn’t. If it is raining Sunday morning, or the Dallas Cowboys are playing at home, or we need to mow the yard, we skip church. Our prayer lives have become endless repetitions of laundry lists of things we think we can’t do without, or complaints to God about how we feel that life is so unfair. We have forgotten to say “thank you” for blessings received; we have forgotten to say “praise to you” for His incomparable attributes; we have forgotten to share with other believers the wondrous things that God has done for us. As a result our prayers become chores and then disappear, and our worship becomes a bore and we coast through in autopilot.
If you want to experience, as David says in Psalm 51, the joy of His saving help again, you get back to doing what you were created to do: Praise, thank, and glorify the Lord. Those Christians that know joy, confidence, peace, and victory are those that make praise a primacy in their lives. You come here and sing. You come here ready to hear the Word of God. You come here to pray and to offer a sacrifice of praise and thanksgiving. You come here to give. End the day with a word of thanks to the Lord for the blessings received. Begin the day with a prayer of thanks for having another day to live in God’s love and service. The Bible is filled from start to finish with praises, with tales of God working mightily in people’s lives which resulted in praises, and admonitions for everyone, everywhere to praise the Lord. Notice the tenses of David’s praise: It involves praise for blessings past, provisions now—even in the midst of trouble, and praise for provision yet to come. Past, present, future. The last verse of the last psalm, Psalm 150:6, synthesizes our joyous obligation: “Let every thing that hath breath praise the LORD. Praise ye the LORD.”
Thirdly, and finally, notice that believers exercises trust in the future faithfulness of the Lord (vv. 9-12). It’s called stepping out on faith. It’s also called living by faith and not by sight. David declares that come what may his fortunes would be tied to God: “My soul hangeth upon thee” (v. 9). Why? Because God is faithful to His covenantal promises and will always, always, always do what He said He would do. In David’s case, it meant deliverance from his enemies. “These also that seek the hurt of my soul, they shall go under the earth” (v. 10). Even though things look bad now, David reasoned, he was still going to trust the Lord to deliver him. Not because of anything intrinsically valuable about David, but because God had sworn to protect him, and God always, always, always keeps His promises. David didn’t worry. He knew his enemies were toast; and he anticipated deliverance, and praised God for it in advance, because He knew God never fails.
Paul reminds in Romans that nothing can separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus. Jesus reminded us that in this world we would have trouble, but not to fret because He had overcome the world. He also reminded us that He would never leave us nor forsake us, and that He would be with us always, even unto the end of the ages. Job was able to say with confidence: “Though he slay me, yet will I trust him” (Job. 13:15). Where does that kind of confidence in God come from? It comes, first of all, from knowing that the Lord always has my best in mind. It comes, secondly, from knowing that there is a life after this one in which all that I can’t make out now will be clear. And thirdly, it comes from knowing God never fails.
What are you thirsty for? What or who are you trusting and finding your satisfaction in? We can and do pursue all sorts of things, but they will ultimately fail us and leave us thirsting again. David’s thirst for God ought to sound familiar. In John chapter 4 Jesus encounters a Samaritan women in the town of Sychar, near Jacob’s well. She had come there for water. And she was thirsty—in ways she was not even able to verbalize. She had had five husbands and was currently living with a man who was not her husband. Jesus said to her: “Anyone who drinks of the water from this well will thirst again. But whoever drinks of the water that I shall give will never thirst again. The water that I give will become a fountain of water springing up into everlasting life.”
C. Samuel Storms, in an article entitled “Is Jesus Really Enough?” (Discipleship Journal, Issue 65) says, “I am persuaded that all of our problems are conceived and born in the sinful belief that something or someone other than Jesus Christ can quench the thirst of our souls.”
My soul thirsteth for thee, my flesh also longeth for thee,
In a barren and dry land where no water is.
Whether we are in the land of Canaan or the desert of Judah, there is only one help, and only one being that can satisfy your agonizing thirst for significance: The Lord who made heaven and earth.
AMEN.
